204 ALEXANDEK VON HUMBOLDT. 



6 Wavering between the theory of chemical action and that 

 of violent eruption, I have always suspected that something 

 higher and better was to be attained, to which the origin of 

 everything could be traced, and for this higher primeval cause 

 we are indebted to your discoveries. 



' Do not however let it distress you that these discoveries, like 

 everything else meant for the well-being of the world, should 

 act with some people like a poison. Philosophy can never 

 prove a hindrance to the advance of empirical science. On the 

 contrary, she traces every new discovery back to fundamental 

 principles, and thus lays the foundation for fresh discoveries. 

 Should there arise a class of men who regard it as more 

 convenient to work out chemistry in their heads, rather than 

 soil their hands in "its pursuit, this cannot be considered as 

 your fault, and certainly not that of the scheme of your 

 philosophy. Ought we to decry mathematical analysis, because 

 our millers are able to construct more efficient machinery than 

 any that a mathematician could devise ? For this mathematics 

 are not to blame, but rather their hasty unphilosophical ap- 

 plication where the necessary link is wanting. I have thus 

 given you, my excellent friend, a candid explanation. Though 

 habitually contemplating nature in her external aspect, there 

 is no one possessed of greater admiration than myself for 

 .the creations educed from the depth and fulness of human 

 thought.' . . . 



In the year 1807 Humboldt thus gave public expression to 

 his sentiments : l ' Not wholly unacquainted with Schelling's 

 system, I am far from believing that the pure study of natural 

 philosophy can be injurious to empirical investigation, or that 

 the investigator and the philosopher should necessarily be 

 opposed. Few physicists have more loudly complained than I 

 have against the unsatisfactory nature of the theories hitherto 

 advanced and against the terms employed ; few have so 

 distinctly expressed their disbelief in the specific differences 

 of the so-called elements. 2 Who has more reason, therefore, to 

 advocate a system which, while undermining the atomic theory 

 on the one hand, and on the other far removed from the one- 



1 Preface to the * Ideen eiuer Geographic der Pflanzen,' p. 5. 



2 ' Versuche iiber die gereizte Muskel- und Nervenfaser/ vol. i. pp. 367, 

 422 , vol. ii. pp. 34, 40. 



